Two major credit card companies this week announced that they will refuse to process payments for “adult” ads on the popular advertising site Backpage.com. Mastercard said Tuesday that it would no longer process these payments; on Wednesday, Visa followed suit. Since American Express did the same earlier this year, that leaves Bitcoin as the only current means of paying for adult ads on Backpage. Both…decided to stop processing the payments upon request from Thomas Dart, a Cook County, Illinois, sheriff on a crusade against Backpage…the…conflation [of consensual sex work with “sex trafficking is based on]…the idea that women are such brainless, innocent creatures we’re unable to have sex for reasons other than pleasure or romance; the idea of actually profiting from men’s desire to have sex with us would never enter our fluffy, pink little brains. So, even if a woman says she’s doing sex work voluntarily, she’s either lying or suffering from “Stockholm syndrome,” and has actually been coerced by a “pimp”…

The essay covers the relative scarcity of “pimps”, the sick relationship between Dart and billionaire whore-hater Swanee Hunt, the resemblance to Operation Choke Point, and the fact that this is a flagrant violation of due process; Backpage has broken no laws and has consistently won challenges in court, so it has to be shut down by the actions of moralistic megalomaniacs. This is not to “stop prostitution”, because it can’t and won’t, not even on Backpage; it’s to punish Backpage for refusing to get on its knees and lick the boots of “authorities” who wanted it to capitulate to their whims so they could win political points in the minds of the Great Unwashed. I don’t use the term “megalomaniac” lightly; Dart’s actions are textbook examples of the mental disorder. He’s not content with exerting his “authority” over Chicago, nor over the whole state of Illinois, nor even over the entire United States; as of this writing Mastercard and Visa are refusing to process payments to Backpage even in countries where sex work is legal, including Canada and Australia. Dart has essentially asserted his will over hundreds of thousands of sex workers all over the globe, overruling their own governments in the process; he honestly thinks his political ambitions trump every single government in the world. That is power-madness of Dr. Doom-like proportions, and if the US government allows his action to stand unchallenged the repercussions will be far greater than sex workers having to find new ways to advertise.

A few practical notes in closing: it seems as though some forms of Visa (including cards issued by at least some Australian and Canadian banks, at least some prepaid debit Visa cards and the “virtual Visa” from Entropay) are still working as of 8:00 UTC today, and some sex workers have offered to help others learn to use Bitcoin. Also, Backpage has issued a promo code which can be used to post if one’s credit cards won’t work; the code is FREESPEECH and can be used as often as one likes “until the payment issues are resolved“. Furthermore, I’m meeting this morning with the CEO of a new escort advertising and screening service due to go online in the next few weeks, which promises to be even more affordable than Backpage; he’s seeking my help in making his site useful and helpful to the sex worker community, which is already a strong sign in its favor (what I’ve seen so far impresses me very much). I’ll keep you posted on developments to this story in my News columns, and of course on Twitter, as I find out about them, and I’ll devote a whole column to that new escort site as soon as it goes live.

14 Responses

This isn’t directly tied into the subject of this essay, Maggie, but something jumped out at me here, the use of the term “Great Unwashed”. Why do we use terms like that? What transgression must one commit (or not commit) in order to be lumped into that group? I mean, I’ve learned from this blog there’s no such thing as the “Great Whoredom” or other mass label that can be applied to all prostitution.

I like many of the concepts libertarians speak about, but there also seems to be an undercurrent of contempt for one’s fellow human beings who haven’t seen the light, if you will. A willingness to condemn them to slavery (Krulac’s admission that this country deserves to be in chains a few months ago made my jaw drop) when such a situation would inevitably affect the libertarians as well.

However, since libertarians view coercion as anathema, their only weapon is logic and reason to convince more people to join them and peacefully make the changes they want made. How can they hope to do that with such insults?

Or is it libertarians don’t want changes made, and want to see everyone’s suffering increased to the point where the “Great Unwashed” finally “burns the system down” so they can remake it in their image (if they are lucky enough to survive such an apocalypse, that is)?

Just to be sure, Maggie, I’m not making any accusations against you specifically. I’m speaking in a general sense based on the past few years of observation.

That’s the crux of it though. Aren’t these the same masses who libertarians need in order to not only make the changes they want to see, but make it permanent? Are we supposed to treat them like unteachable morons (and then act surprised when they don’t do as we’d prefer) or do we treat them as potential allies and, dare I say, equals?

This is very depressing to hear. I salute you, Maggie, in your efforts to make sex work safe for sex workers. Please let me know how I can help.

I’m tired of constantly trying to get people to see the switch in the frame. One of those is trafficking, and the switch is done this way: there are a number of entries into sex work, whether it’s stripping, porn, massage or escorting (to name but a few), and all of those avenues can be voluntary. Being trafficked–note the passive voice–is but a small segment of the way people get into the industry.

I’m constantly combatting the presumption that no woman would ever voluntarily enter into or consider sex work. One elected official asked me how I’d feel if my daughter went into massage sex work as opposed to working in a nail salon (as those two are often juxtaposed), posing that to me as an apt comparison. It was his attempt to display the shame that our society imposes on sex work; it was his attempt to understand where he places sex work. When I said I’d buy my daughter a box of condoms and guide her and point her to people whom I know could help her make good money in the high end, his point was lost.

I also see long-time advocates and workers abandoning decriminalization in favor of a human rights approach, but we need concrete goals–if the human rights approach leads to decrim, sure, I’m on board, but I’m on board that train anyway. The decrim movement feels so diffuse and feels like it’s under attack from all quarters, but everyone I talk with–men, especially–says they support decrim. And, many also feel they can’t take a strong stand because their position in the community would be compromised. I understand.

I’m 62, and I’m passionate about this issue. Being honest, that’s how I undertake causes–I get real into them, and after a while that passion dies and a new one takes its place. Even though I say I’m tired, I’m still passionate, and I like finding new ways to message such a crucial issue. I hope I can sustain this passion long enough to see the decrim of sex work in my lifetime.

I don’t think the lawman thought this idea through completely, not surprisingly. Any time you make something more difficult for an individual sex worker to achieve her goals, You open the door to managers, agents, guides and other leeches to work their way into the lives of sex workers. Nicely done, Officer Dart

I’m sure that’s exactly what he had in mind, making things harder so he (or someone else) can point to those leeches and say “see, I told you there was evil afoot!”

Anyway, this in particular probably won’t last long, at least not at Dart’s level. I doubt the federal government is going to let one guy in rinky-dink Chicago muscle in on their domain of “job-killing” regulations.

Maggie, let me say that you are on “right-on” on this article. All you need is one cop or high-faluting moralist to say your hobby or livelihood is wrong–even if they can’t say how–and you have lost that hobby or livelihood.
“I tremble for my country when I remember that God is Just.” –Thomas Jefferson

Like most of sex worker twitter, I’ve been tweeting my ass off about this.

I’m repeating myself in this comment, but (as you noted in your blog post), let’s consider the ramifications of the Backpage “defunding”: a random bureaucrat (he’s an important guy, but not THAT important), not even a DA acting with official authority from the State, just fucking defunded a legal business, overnight, because he doesn’t like what that business does.

Let’s follow this chain of logic through it its inevitable conclusion: it means that a COP–a top cop, but still, essentially, a cop–can tell CC companies to stop funding any business the cop/bureaucrat finds offensive/believes is “victimizing” people (without evidence). So, he could defund far-right/far-left websites (threaten their ISPs!), people who sell “offensive” political t-shirts, alternative news organizations that sell their content online, porn, radical animal rights orgs, etc! “Fuels/Funds Terrorism/Terrorist Supporters”! Fundamentalist religious sects–Amish, Muslim, Jewish–who sell stuff online–them, too!

It’s not his place, or in his authority, literally, to be doing this.

I can’t believe this is happening. Dart, this smug middle-class asshole, doesn’t understand that lots and lots of women and their families need this advertising venue to LIVE. Eros and Slixa don’t cover everywhere, and not everyone is on the Hobbyist boards.

It’s wrong on so many different levels. If Backpage can’t provide adult ads, then it should be shut down by lawyers working for the official legal arm of the State using due process, in plain sight. Barney Fife in Chicago doesn’t get to decide these things.

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